Salesforce considers Twitter acquisition to boost its AI efforts

Salesforce is reportedly considering purchasing Twitter in a move that would give the software company access to the huge amount of data generated by the social network and could help fuel its push to develop artificial intelligence. Marc Benioff, the CEO of Salesforce.com, has grown his 17-year-old company to compete against Microsoft, Oracle and other big players in the field. Lately, the company has acquired a number of startups working in e-commerce and artificial intelligence. Talks between Twitter and Salesforce are said to be at an early stage but an acquisition could end up helping both companies. Twitter’s shares rose by 21 per cent to $22.62 on Friday after it was reported that a sale to Salesforce could be in the works. The social network’s stock has fallen 30 per cent over…